


Exhibit A

by 1shinymess (magpie4shinies)



Category: Suits (TV)
Genre: M/M, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-03
Updated: 2011-09-03
Packaged: 2017-10-23 09:33:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/248824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magpie4shinies/pseuds/1shinymess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for <a href="http://suitsmeme.livejournal.com/1110.html?thread=152150#t152150">the whump prompt</a> on suitsmeme. An encounter with some people from Mike's past yields surprising results for both Mike and Harvey.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Exhibit A

**Author's Note:**

> Set three days after E3: Inside Track.

"Really? I mean, I just beat my personal best for ferreting out useful information for you. Seriously, nine hundred and fifty-seven pages in _three hours_. You're not even a little impressed?"

"Let me check....hm. Nope."

Mike really wants to punch Harvey sometimes. It would be easier to accept if he decided not to because Harvey is his boss, doing him a huge favor with the job, putting his own neck out there, or because Mike figures he really does like him, knows he finds his help invaluable and he's just trying to keep him grounded or teach him a lesson or something, but...

While all of those reasons for not doing it are valid, the real reason he'll never get physical with Harvey is that he's pretty sure getting his ass kicked by a man with manicured nails while he's wearing a three thousand dollar suit really will crush his masculine pride beyond recovery.

And they're actually leaving the _Pearson Hardman_ building at a decent hour, which means the sun is just starting to set. The fact that Mike is getting to _see_ the sun is a sign that Harvey appreciates his work and that drains most of the anger. As for what remains...he knows he should take what victories he can get, but he'd still like to hear the words.

The elevator comes to a rest at the lobby floor and they exit. "Oh, come on. Do you think anyone else would've been able to do that? In the same amount of time?"

Harvey gave him a slightly narrow look, mouth curling up in his near-constant faint smirk. It's a versatile expression. Today, it's saying _maybe not, but it would've gotten done and I still would have won because I'm a winner,_ and also _I'm still the one holding the cards_ , both of which are true.

Mike rolls his eyes and looks away from his Smug. He catches sight of something that pings in his memory and frowns. Across the street from the building, Mike sees some guys that can't possibly have any legitimate business this side of town, and they're text book loitering, smoking.

Mike slows down as he processes this and Harvey notices after two steps and looks back curiously. Mike watches him look from the corner of his eye and doesn't manage to pull his attention from the gang bangers quick enough.

"Friends of yours?" Harvey asks casually, looking back at Mike.

Mike shakes his head and quickly catches up with him. "They're thugs: Trevor used them once a long time ago and then decided he'd find other ways to collect his money. They usually run with gangs, as far as I know."

"Hm." Harvey waives at the security guard and turns on his heel when he's sure the guard is moving.

Mike's eyes widen. "Wait! Harvey!" He jogs a few steps to catch up and they leave the building together, the guard a few steps behind them.

They're spotted a few steps from the doors and when they exit the building, the men are already crossing the street to meet them. "This is a bad idea," he mutters, but Harvey is obviously not listening.

And it turns out that he's right. The only thing they figure out is that the men are there for Harvey, not Mike. Which is useful, sure, but less important in the immediate future.

Harvey comes to a stop on the corner and the three men are close enough to be shielded from traffic by the parked cars along the road. Mike reluctantly steps up to stand beside Harvey, already running through the many ways this is going to go violently awry.

Two of the men are white, one a light brown that could be from three other ethnicities. They all have black bands around their right biceps. Mike memorizes their features automatically.

The door behind them opens and Mike hears the faint sound of displaced air because he's hyped, thinking _these are not nice men_.

At the same time the security guard is exiting the building, Mike sees the man to his farthest left tense and shift; his hand starts to lift, and the fading sunlight glints briefly off of a grooved piece of metal along his knuckles.

Mike doesn't know Harvey's past, doesn't know if he knows enough to recognize brass knuckles or if he even saw them. He finds himself ducking in front of Harvey and pushing him back at the same time the punch lands.

The pain is staggering. Trevor just threw him into a post three days ago, and this is _exponentially_ worse than that. He doesn't black out, exactly, but his vision goes briefly black while pain stabs into his jaw and radiates along lines of shredded flesh and his ears roar with the blood rushing to his head and for a minute, he's awake but unaware of what's going on around him.

His vision starts to clear first, color blossoming into the black in painful increments. He's leaning against something, probably Harvey. He blinks rapidly, trying to force his eyes to refocus and realizes he's staring at Harvey's face at a new angle.

"Are you actually holding me up?" he asks. It comes out slurred, potentially too muddled to understand. Harvey doesn't answer even if he does understand the question, just looks down with his face set in disapproving, almost angry lines.

Mike decides he doesn't want to deal with a pissy Harvey after taking a reinforced left hook for him and closes his eyes and focuses on breathing.

His jaw isn't broken. He's a hair shorter than Harvey, which seems to have saved him some damage: the blow landed on the soft part of his cheek and ripped up along his cheekbone. He hopes the teeth he can feel loose in his mouth tighten back up.

The guard takes down the first two of the guys in about three seconds and chases down the third to do the same. He doesn't ask questions when Harvey tells him to take down their information from their IDs and let them go. Mike wants to ask _what the fuck?_ but even though his jaw may not be broken, it's still incredibly painful.

He even helps load Mike's bike into the trunk of Harvey's car after the valet brings it around. Mike doesn't argue because he can barely keep up with Harvey under good circumstances, let alone without being able to argue easily.

He loosens his jaw in increments, easing it open and then carefully working it side to side, wincing. When he can, he braces himself and asks, "why'n't you call the cops?"

Harvey glances over and his mouth tightens briefly before he returns his eyes to the road. "If they do any digging into your background, we have more people who can prove you lied."

"We lied," Mike corrects, and then winces and holds up his hands in immediate surrender when Harvey scowls at him.

"I have a pretty good idea who hired them, based on what happened anyway," Harvey says after a few minutes of slightly tense silence. "I can handle it better than the cops if I'm right."

"Hm..." Mike isn't sure about that, but he isn't going to argue. He looks out the window for a distraction from the throbbing in his jaw and realizes the scenery is unfamiliar. "Where are we going?"

Harvey looks over briefly. "My place. I don't think you have a concussion but if you do, and I send you home to slip off into a painless coma, I have to interview again. That is a hell I hope to avoid. Feel privileged: usually the only people that get to see my apartment look better in a dress than you could ever hope to."

Mike wants to roll his eyes but when he starts to, the natural, automatic tilt of his head pulls some of the welts raised by the metal and he makes a tiny sound and leans back into the seat.

"What on earth possessed you to do that, by the way?" Harvey asks almost immediately.

"Hm?" Mike's feeling a little sleepy now, and is smart enough to know that's bad. He tries to focus on the conversation. "Oh. He was going to punch you. Wearing brass knuckles."

"Your automatic reaction to someone getting punched in the face is to fling yourself in the line of fire?"

Mike blinks. Actually, no. It really isn't. "Not usually," he admits. He's not exactly a pacifist, but he definitely isn't a fan of confrontation.

"So..."

"I don't know," Mike says, a little uncomfortable with the topic. _I've got a good idea though,_ he definitely doesn't add. More appropriately, he finishes, "I just realized what he was going to do, and...I didn't think about it."

He risks a look over at Harvey, who's frowning at the road, and his stomach twists like it had last week when he realized how much he'd let Harvey down by listening to Louis. "Don't tell me you're mad at me?"

Harvey blinks, turns to him, back to the road, and then back to him when he pulls up at a red light. "Mad at you?"

Mike shrugs, looking down at the gear shift, and then out the front windshield, absently memorizing the plates of passing cars. "You sort of have this look, sometimes."

"I have a look," Harvey says, the same words but shaped with a heavy skepticism not present in Mike's statement.

"I don't know," Mike mutters quickly, more insistently, thinking _shut up, shut up_ and lifts a hand to cover his eyes as the car starts moving again. "Whatever."

Harvey makes a sound, thoughtful and enlightened and _completely useless_. He doesn't say anything else on the rest of the ride and Mike knows he must be plotting, but he's happy enough for the respite to let it slide.

It's hard to follow all of his thoughts to their conclusions. Sitting quietly is nice.

"Come on, Sleeping Beauty," Harvey says some time later. "This chariot's about to turn into a pumpkin."

Mike stumbles out of the car. He'll appreciate the artistry of the manufacturing later. Right now, he's just grateful that it's stationary as he props himself up against it and waits for the head rush to fade. "Different stories," he points out after a beat. "Also, wasn't sleeping."

Somehow, Harvey is right next to him when he speaks. "You really are mostly useless."

Mike chances opening his eyes and Harvey's expression is exasperated and fond, _fond_ , Mike can tell even through the pain.

He even slides one of his arms around Mike's middle and tugs him away from the car. "Come on, up, up or I'm sending you home in a cab."

"You like me," Mike accuses, trying to keep his feet under him when Harvey starts toward the apartment building.

"Now you're having delusions," Harvey says, tugging Mike's left arm over his shoulders. "I'm bringing you in because people will get the wrong idea if I leave you here. _Not_ because I care."

Mike swallows, head rush gone but now having to deal with the long line of heat where he and Harvey are touching.

Harvey looks at him, frowning, and then shakes his head and tugs him forward. He walks Mike through the building lobby into the elevator. The guard on duty has a slightly strange smile on his face when they walk passed.

It looks a little like Mrs. Birstrom's smile. She'd been his grandmother's roommate for a while, after her stroke. She was nice. He waves as they go by his desk and focuses on not throwing up.

The elevator ride is thankfully sans muzak, like the one at _Pearson Hardman_. "Did I ever tell you that's one of my favorite things?" Mike asks. "Seriously. Besides the whole dream job, working for you thing. Second favorite."

Harvey frowns at him and then shakes his head. "I'm _pretty sure_ you aren't concussed. Neither of your pupils are dilated too badly...whatever. As long as you don't confess your love for me, babble away."

Mike nods against his shoulder. "I try to avoid falling for straight guys. 'S how I met Trevor. Third grade, Mr. Sandberg's class. He seduced me. Stupid _Gushers._ "

"And this is moving into territory I really need bourbon to fake comfort in," Harvey mutters, shifting Mike's weight to unlock the door just as Mike realizes they're in front of it.

Mike laughs a little, more worried about vomiting on Harvey's suit than outing himself. "Sorry," he offers. "I wasn't sure if you knew. _Wow_ , your apartment is _amazing_."

"It really is." Harvey basically carries Mike to a dark gray couch, ignoring the first half of the sentence. "Feel free to bask as long as you don't _touch anything._ "

Mike drops easily to the couch when Harvey lets go of his arm and tilts, then helpfully lifts his limbs in response to Harvey's grabs. Things get confused for a minute and then Mike is suddenly laying out on the couch without his jacket and Harvey's hair is actually a little mussed.

Mike stares at it in fascination. "I didn't know it could do that," he says, reaching out to touch. It's strangely soft. "You use glue?" he asks, head tilting curiously. "It's nice."

Harvey stares at him with a funny, wide-eyed expression and Mike smiles up at him, still petting his hair.

Harvey finally slaps Mike's hand away and smooths his hair back down, shaking his head. "I'm going to be arrested, then fired," he says.

Mike frowns. "Why? You're a pretty good guy, despite the whole...asshole lawyer...thing."

"Going to hell," Harvey says again and then shakes his head one more time, firmly and points straight at Mike. "Do not move. I'll be right back."

"I like your pants," Mike tells him. It's something he's been wanting to say for a while. "They fit nicely."

Harvey blinks. His mouth opens and then closes. "Shit."

He walks away. Mike takes a nap.

"Wake up or you're fired."

Mike goes from sleeping to awake in an instant, panicking. He jerks, remembers he's on a couch and overcompensates in the wrong direction and ends up on the floor at Harvey's feet.

 _Oh, God why?_ is the one clear thought going through his mind.

"You good?" Harvey asks, taking a drink of something from a white mug.

"...yeah," Mike mutters, feeling more together than he had before. And wincing, because, hey, talking with a bruised and scraped jaw _hurts_. He can only imagine what it'll feel like tomorrow after the bruise has time to really set in.

He pushes up off the floor and leans back against the couch, one hand gingerly touching his jaw. "That really happened," he mumbles. His jaw hurts more and he's thinking a little clearer. He doubts they're connected.

"Glad to see you're with us," Harvey says, and then--

"Son of a bitch!" Mike yelps, spasming away from the _coldcoldcold_.

"Ice your jaw, slugger."

"I hate you so much," Mike mumbles, pressing the ice pack tentatively to his jaw and glaring up at him. His eyes widen and his mouth opens and it's probably only subconscious preservation preventing him from doing anything that would hurt even more than talking that keeps him from gaping like an idiot.

"You have elbows," he says, blinking.

Harvey snorts. He's wearing a gray t-shirt a little looser than his normal shirt and vest combination. The sleeves stop under his deltoid, bringing attention to his well-defined biceps. His elbows both exist and actually connect to his wrists all the way down.

Maybe he's less together than he thought. "Are you wearing _sweatpants_?"

Harvey smirks. "Nobody here I need to impress."

Mike looks away first. Something about that statement is off, but he's still distracted. Harvey also apparently has feet. _Real feet_. It's a revelation.

Thankfully, Harvey's distractingly-normal feet withdraw from his field of vision before he can say something else inane. _What just happened?_ he wonders, carefully pulling himself back up onto the couch. He tries to fortify himself and closes his eyes as he presses the ice to the bruised cheek. After throbbing a little more, the cold does start to help.

"Good start," Harvey says. Mike looks up and immediately flinches as a black towel lands on his face.

"Don't whine," Harvey orders brusquely, tugging the hand holding the icepack away.

"What--"

Pressure along his jaw answers him and he flinches. The towel is softer than any other towel he's ever used, but nothing could make it feel good on his abraded, bruised skin, especially not when he isn't prepared for it.

Harvey's other hand slides into his hair above his right temple and uses it to hold him still. "Don't move," he orders. "These need to be cleaned."

Mike swallows, distracted enough by the very strange situation to listen. Harvey continues carefully moving the cloth over Mike's cheek.

Mike swallows, not sure where to look and not sure how he feels. Harvey doesn't touch him very often and never for any extended length of time. His stomach is twisting up in confusion and his earlier nausea hasn't fully abated.

He focuses on breathing and looking forward and accidentally memorizes the weave of Harvey's sweatpants and the angle of his dick beneath them. _Jesus. Things I do not need to know._

Harvey stops fussing with the towel after a few minutes and folds the soiled part inward, then drops it onto Mike's shoulder. He picks up a brown bottle from the end table and twists off the cap.

"Peroxide," he says at the same time Mike realizes what it is. Harvey stoppers the mouth with a cotton ball and tilts the bottle to the side. Mike wants to ask him about Neosporin but his voice has deserted him under a wave of _seriously, what is happening **right now**?_

Harvey sets the bottle of peroxide down and laughs when he looks at Mike. "Don't pout, princess," he mutters, sliding his free hand back into Mike's hair and tilting it so his check is raised a little higher. "Don't like it, don't do anything this stupid again."

Mike glares up at him, brow furrowed and mouth pursed and silent because Harvey could make this even more painful than it already is if he feels like being a dick-- _oh, wait._

Harvey touches the cotton to one of the scrapes and Mike hisses air in through his teeth as the burn of pain whites out his anger at the unfairness.

"I know you took the punch for me," Harvey says after a moment, lifting the cotton and then returning in a slightly different place. Peroxide drips down Mike's jaw in thin rivulets he can feel down his neck until they're absorbed by the towel. "But _I_ can fight my own battles. I'm what you call an _adult_. OK, champ?"

Mike rolls his eyes and arches his eyebrows to indicate his question. Harvey had said something similar earlier.

Harvey obligingly lifts the hand with the cotton ball.

"You know who...?"

Harvey sets the dirty cotton into the bowl he'd brought with him, also on the end table and gets another cotton ball wet with peroxide. Mike quickly returns his head to the angle it had been in when Harvey let him ask his question and Harvey's eyes narrow slightly. "I have a pretty good idea," he says. "I'll handle it."

Mike wants to tell him he'll help, if he can. Harvey's almost-smirk becomes a real smile. "I know," he says, and Mike smiles back at him, lopsided and faint because it hurts to move his face too much, but genuine. It's nice to be able to talk to someone like that. He and Trevor know-- _had known, it's really, definitely past tense now, damn it_ \--each other so well they could complete each other's sentences.

Harvey shakes his head and continues cleaning out the scrapes. "You're going to get me in way more trouble than I predicted," he says quietly as he continues to pat Mike's face with the disinfectant.

Mike wants to know what he means. But he has an idea, and it's...well. _Not yet,_ he thinks. His jaw hurts, he's tired from an early start and he still has to bike home and be into work early tomorrow morning.

Harvey finishes with the peroxide, hands him the slightly melted ice pack and takes the decision from him. "So on a scale of one to Adam Lambert, how gay are you?"

Mike pulls back from him a little to give him a proper disbelieving stare. "What?"

"You're in love with me."

Mike frowns. "Uh...and you're basing that on...what, exactly?"

Harvey's eyebrows tilt up sardonically. "Let's not play that game, OK? You just threw yourself in front of a bullet for me."

"I did not--"

Harvey rolls his eyes impatiently and interrupts him. "A punch reinforced by _brass knuckles_ , then."

Mike frowns, careful to keep the ice-pack on his jaw. "That doesn't mean I'm in _love_ with you."

Harvey laughs. "Maybe it doesn't," he allows. "But you are. You think I'm amazing. It's fine, Mike. Nobody could blame you. It means you actually do have good taste with some things."

Mike looks at him incredulously and Harvey smirks. "Oh, my God, _really?_ " Mike moans, dragging his free hand through his hair. "God, your _ego_..."

"Don't act like you don't love it," Harvey says. Mike looks at him and Harvey holds up one hand. "Exhibit B--I'm counting your inept but clearly heartfelt attempt at heroism earlier as Exhibit A. Exhibit B: you haven't actually denied it."

 _Fuck._ Mike teeters over a precipice for a moment, feeling vaguely ridiculous holding an icepack to his throbbing jaw, still wearing a suit more expensive than his entire wardrobe of three months ago, with Harvey standing in front of him, arms and elbows and feet bare, and peroxide and cotton balls on the table.

 _Just...fuck it._ He takes a breath and meets Harvey's eyes directly. "So what?"

Harvey's expression is inscrutable. Mike doesn't look away. Harvey smiles. "Promising."

Mike blinks. "Wait, what?"

Harvey nods faintly and shifts his weight. "Keep that jaw iced. We'll talk when you're well enough to be seen with me outside of the office."

 _Wait... **what?** Did that just--_ Mike can't even complete the thought. It's just so...unlikely.

Harvey collects the peroxide and bowl of dirty cotton balls and Mike realizes he may loose his opportunity to get an answer about this tonight.

"Wait, Harvey--are you...did you just _ask me out_?"

Harvey grins. "If you're ballsy enough to take a punch for me and adult enough to admit your feelings...you might actually be interesting enough to date."

Mike isn't sure if he's angry or excited. "Interesting."

Harvey looks him over like he's undressing him. "Yeah. _Interesting._ I already know you're trainable."

Mike is uncomfortably hot under his collar now, and Harvey looks like he knows it. "You _bastard_. You have, seriously man, you have the worst timing _ever_."

Harvey snorts. "Not my fault you didn't man up before."

"Seriously?" Mike asks. "The part where you ride my ass daily about keeping work professional and it's my fault I don't confess my _highly unprofessional_ feelings?"

Harvey shrugs. "If you're going to do it, do it right. Otherwise, it's just pathetic."

"Of course," Mike mutters as Harvey takes his supplies back to the bathroom, presumably. "Harvey Specter's philosophy for life."

Harvey's voice comes through the wall. "No, my philosophy for life is _win._ "

Mike stares at the door Harvey had closed behind him incredulously. "Oh, my God, do you have bat ears or something? Jesus."

A startling bang on the wall answers him. "Just accept that I'm exceptional at everything I do and you'll be fine."

 _...of course,_ Mike thinks, slumping into the couch in resignation. _I had to fall for an egomaniac. Fuck my life._


End file.
